February 10, 2006

MORE: A commenter asks "Where's Lake Mendota"? Hmmm.... Well, you can always get a good look at Lake Mendota, right now, here. There have been some art projects on the lake ice before, most famously, this one:

20 comments:

So... will people on the right complain because those damn leftists peacenicks have made a public display against the war in Iraq... or will people on the left complain because its a blatant show of religion to use Christmas trees in a public space?

i loved seeing this post, it's a nice break. i spent most of my years at UW living at the SAE house on the lake, and i'll never forget the first time the ice broke in a springtime windstorm and came crashing on shore in the middle of the night. coming from the arid state of colorado, i thought a jet had landed out there.

in my first year at uw, it only took me a week or so to be confident enough to walk on the ice on mendota from my dorm room over to campus. it shortened the walk along the lakeshore path, but hearing the gurgling of water underneath always made me a bit skittish.

until i saw a band of vw beetles driving on it one day, i never understood just how freakin cold it gets up there.

waitaminute, I thought that was Kevin Murphy? I remember that, because I remember reading about that somewhere (I think it was on the cover of the Wisconsin State Journal when I was a paperboy). years later I heard about that guy who was the president of the student body who did it, and I thought that was Murphy.

Follow the link for the the Liberty statue to get answers to various questions.

"The presence of Lady Liberty on Lake Mendota was the handiwork of Jim Mallon and Leon Varjian, the two leaders of the University of Wisconsin-Madison's notorious Pail and Shovel (P&S) party."

"the statue had been constructed in a woodworking shop out of chicken wire, papier-mâché, and plywood.."

Some serious work went into building that statue. People remember it fondly because it was so well done and so amusing.

The Christmas tree thing, on the other hand. First, did you note that the article just called them "evergreens," as if there was some way to get a lot of evergreens that wasn't picking up all the discarded Christmas trees we've all left out at the curb? Anyway, it was pretty easy to just collect people's trees and then stick them in the ice. Very little artistry here.

As to leaving them to litter the lake, the article credits the artist with risking his safety to retrieve the trees from the thin ice.

Fond memories of Madison. I went to the UW in the 80's and lady liberty and the flamingos on the hill were pretty cool. I am originally from Waunakee which is north of Madison about 10 miles.Nice place to visit or go to school but I wouldn't want to live there.I prefer the east coast.